A. general, huderos Hp.Int.26 ; katholikon, to, generic description, Stoic.2.74; katholika, ta, title of work by Zeno, ib. 1.14; emphasis (v. sub voc.) Plb.6.5.3, cf. 1.57.4; k. kai koinê historia Id.8.2.11 ; k. perilêpsis D.H.Comp.12 ; k. paradoseis Phld. Rh.1.126S. ; k. theôrêma Cic.Att.14.20.3 ; k. praecepta, Quint.2.13.14 ; -ôteroi logoi general, opp. eidikoi, S.E.P.2.84, cf. Hermog.Meth. 5; k. prosôidia, title of work by Hdn.Gr. on accents; nomos -ôteros Ph.2.172 ; k. epistolê an epistle general, 1 Ep.Pet.tit.; of general interest, BGU19i5(ii A.D.); universal, k. tis estin kai theia hê tautotês kai hê heterotês Dam.Pr.310 . Adv. -kôs generally, apophênasthai Plb. 4.1.8 ; eipein in general terms, Str.17.3.10 , cf. Phld.Rh.1.161 S.; k. heurisketai ti Hermog.Inv.3.11 ; k., opp. plêthikôs ('in the majority of cases'), OGI669.49(Egypt, i A.D.); universally, Porph.Sent.22: Comp. -ôteron Plb.3.37.6 , Gal.18(1).15; -ôterôs Tz.ad Lyc.16.
The second meaning had everything to do with contemporary politics and government administration:
II. as Subst., katholikos , ho, supervisor of accounts ( [hoi katholou logoi] ), = Lat. procurator a rationibus, Euphratês ho k. Gal.14.4 , cf. Jahresh.23 Beibl.269(Ephes., ii A.D.); in Egypt, = Lat. rationalis, PLond.3.1157 (iii A.D.), IGRom.1.1211 (Diocletian), POxy.2106.25(iv A.D.), etc.; also, = consularis, Gloss.; in cent. iv, also, = rationalis summarum, Teôrgiôi k. Jul.Ep.188 , 189 tit.
The interesting thing is that Semitic speaking cultures (Christian or otherwise) never lost sight of this secondary meaning as the word was absorbed into Aramaic and Syriac as a term which meant 'controller of the treasury' or 'officer' in the Imperial administration.
I came across a document from the Syrian Orthodox Church which notes for instance that:
The term ‘Catholicos’ (Katholikos) is derived from the Greek words ‘Kath-Holikos’, meaning ‘General Primate’ or ‘General Vicar’. Even before the primates of the Church adopted this title, it existed in the Roman Empire where its Government representative who was in charge of a large area was called as ‘Catholicos’. The Government servant, who was in charge of State treasury, too was known in that name. In due course, the secular administrative heads in Persian Empire also adopted this title.
The Churches (mainly outside the Roman Empire) started to use this term for their chief Bishops much later, probably by 4th or 5th centuries. Now the primates of the Orthodox Churches in Armenia, Georgia, Iraq and India, use the title ‘Catholicos’. ‘Maphriyono’ (Maphrian) is derived from the Syriac word afri, “to make fruitful’, or "one who gives fecundity". This title came to be used exclusively for the head of the Syrian Orthodox Church in the East (Persia), after the prelates who occupied the office of the Catholicate since late 5th century adopted Nestorian Christology and separated from the rest of Christendom. From the mid 13th century onwards, a few occupants of the Maphrianate were referred also as ‘Catholicos’, but the title never came into extensive usage. However in the 20th century when this office of the Maphrianate under the Holy See of Antioch was reinstated in India, the chief of the local church assumed the title ‘Catholicos’. It is this title that is being used in India today, while the title ‘Maphriyono’ (Maphrian) has fell out of popular use.
I happen to think that Maphriyono goes back to Polycarp (a strange name which means the same thing). Yet notice that the Eastern churches still retain the use of katholikos as a title. This is well recognized.
Jastrow notes in his Dictionary of Jewish Aramaic that the term was incorporated in this non-Christian culture in the same original sense. In other words to mean 'financial officer, controller' and was used in Judaism to denote 'an officer of the Temple treasury.' [Exodus Rabba s. 37, beg.]
It would stand to reason that the title katholikos was used to denote 'financial officer' while the Temple stood thus long before the second century period where it shows up in Catholic Christianity to denote the supposedly 'universal' Church.
Some notable examples of this term katholikos in the rabbinic literature include
like a king that had a friend, and when he wanted to appoint a controller (financial officer), he appointed him over the entire treasury. [Y'lmad to Gen. XLIX; Numbers Rabba s. 18]
Korah who was the controller of Pharoah's palace and had in charge the key etc. [Y. Shek. V 49a]
there were never more than two katholici in the Temple treasury [Cant. Rabba to VII. 9]
The point of course is that if Jews and other Semitic speaking were using the term katholikos to denote an officer of the treasury as early as the first century CE (i.e. when the Temple was still standing) it is hard to argue that when Irenaeus reports a contemporary Marcionite criticism of his church controlling (or being controlled by) the treasury of the Emperor Commodus there was an underlying connection to the world katholikos that has not been recognized hitherto.
The section in Irenaeus' Against the Heresies (IV.30.1) begins:
Those, again, who cavil and find fault because the people did, by God's command, upon the eve of their departure, take vessels of all kinds and raiment from the Egyptians," and so went away, from which [spoils], too, the tabernacle was constructed in the wilderness, prove themselves ignorant of the righteous dealings of God, and of His dispensations; as also the presbyter remarked: For if God had not accorded this in the typical exodus, no one could now be saved in our true exodus; that is, in the faith in which we have been established, and by which we have been brought forth from among the number of the Gentiles.
As Hill notes (Lost Teachings of Polycarp p. 55) the 'presbyter' mentioned by Irenaeus is Polycarp. Hill argues that Irenaeus argument is that the status that Irenaeus and others had in the Imperial court of Commodus represented a kind of restoration of the Israelites who had been thrown out of Egypt. As he writes:
It may well be that the reference to the acquisition of the 'mammon of unrighteousness' (cf. Lk 16) which follows was an example given by the presbyter (Polycarp). Certainly throughout the remainder of 40.30.1-4 Irenaeus refers to the situation in his own day. As Bacq says Irenaeus' addresses to his contemproraries (30.1.1,3,4) and his allusion to believers in the royal court (30.1.line 23) and to the Roman peace (30.3.line 71) reveal the hand of Irenaeus himself. It is in 4.30.1 where Irenaeus refers to believers in the royal court who get their living from what belongs to Caesar. This is, of course, is a reference to his contemporaries and, I have suggested, to Florinus himself.
Yet it clearly refers also to Irenaeus himself and is rooted in the identification of his community as a 'Catholic' Church. We read in what follows in Irenaeus again that;
For in some cases there follows us a small, and in others a large amount of property, which we have acquired from the mammon of unrighteousness. For from what source do we derive the houses in which we dwell, the garments in which we are clothed, the vessels which we use, and everything else ministering to our every-day life, unless it be from those things which, when we were Gentiles, we acquired by avarice, or received them from our heathen parents, relations, or friends who unrighteously obtained them?--not to mention that even now we acquire such things when we are in the faith. For who is there that sells, and does not wish to make a profit from him who buys? Or who purchases anything, and does not wish to obtain good value from the seller? Or who is there that carries on a trade, and does not do so that he may obtain a livelihood thereby? And as to those believing ones who are in the royal palace, do they not derive the utensils they employ from the property which belongs to Caesar; and to those who have not, does not each one of these [Christians] give according to his ability? The Egyptians were debtors to the [Jewish] people, not alone as to property, but as their very lives, because of the kindness of the patriarch Joseph in former times; but in what way are the heathen debtors to us, from whom we receive both gain and profit? Whatsoever they amass with labour, these things do we make use of without labour, although we are in the faith.
The critical line here is Irenaeus' acknowledgement of the Marcionite criticism that the freedmen and slaves who made up the Catholic Church at Commodus' court were supported by the Emperor's purse - ex eis quae Caesaris sunt. In other words, the Imperial treasury 'floated' this new Church. Each member had a good livelihood. Irenaeus' defends this situation by saying that each gave as much as they could to those in want - his qui non habent unusqisque eorum secundum suam virtutem praestat. Yet the bottom line is unmistakable.
The Marcionites identified Irenaeus' Church as katholikos because they controlled or had access to the Imperial treasury.
One could argue that Irenaeus' church was always identified itself as 'Catholic' and the Marcionites were ridiculing them with the secondary meaning of the term katholikos - but I am not so sure.
The term 'Pharisee' originally began as a term of derision but later was taken over by the group as a term of distinction.
Please don't cite 'Ignatius' and the use of this term. Irenaeus can be unmistakably tied to the development of the Ignatian canon.
Notice how much time not only Irenaeus but Tertullian and other Fathers spend tackling this Marcionite ridicule. The inference was of course that just as the old nation of Israel was established by 'unrighteous mammon' the Church of Irenaeus was 'floated' by the Imperial treasury (or perhaps the plunder of Marcionite churches especially in Egypt? ...)
Here is the rest of Irenaeus' testimony. See how charge that the plunder of the 'Egyptian synagogues' of Mark went into the Imperial treasury and financed the new 'Catholic Church':
Up to that time the people served the Egyptians in the most abject slavery, as saith the Scripture: "And the Egyptians exercised their power rigorously upon the children of Israel; and they made life bitter to them by severe labours, in mortar and in brick, and in all manner of service in the field which they did, by all the works in which they oppressed them with rigour." And with immense labour they built for them fenced cities, increasing the substance of these men throughout a long course of years, and by means of every species of slavery; while these [masters] were not only ungrateful towards them, but had in contemplation their utter annihilation. In what way, then, did [the Israelites] act unjustly, if out of many things they took a few, they who might have possessed much property had they not served them, and might have gone forth wealthy, while, in fact, by receiving only a very insignificant recompense for their heavy servitude, they went away poor? It is just as if any free man, being forcibly carried away by another, and serving him for many years, and increasing his substance, should be thought, when he ultimately obtains some support, to possess some small portion of his [master's] property, but should in reality depart, having obtained only a little as the result of his own great labours, and out of vast possessions which have been acquired, and this should be made by any one a subject of accusation against him, as if he had not acted properly. He (the accuser) will rather appear as an unjust judge against him who had been forcibly carried away into slavery. Of this kind, then, are these men also, who charge the people with blame, because they appropriated a few things out of many, but who bring no charge against those who did not render them the recompense due to their fathers' services; nay, but even reducing them to the most irksome slavery, obtained the highest profit from them. And [these objectors] allege that [the Israelites] acted dishonestly, because, for-sooth, they took away for the recompense of their labours, as I have observed, unstamped gold and silver in a few vessels; while they say that they themselves (for lot truth be spoken, although to some it may seem ridiculous) do act honestly, when they carry away in their girdles from the labours of others, coined gold, and silver, and brass, with Caesar's inscription and image upon it.
If, however, a comparison be instituted between us and them, [I would ask] which party shall seem to have received [their worldly goods] in the fairer manner? Will it be the [Jewish] people, [who took] from the Egyptians, who were at all points their debtors; or we, [who receive property] from the Romans and other nations, who are under no similar obligation to us? Yea, moreover, through their instrumentality the world is at peace, and we walk on the highways without fear, and sail where we will. Therefore, against men of this kind (namely, the heretics) the word of the Lord applies, which says: "Thou hypocrite, first cast the beam out of thine eye, and then shalt thou see clearly to pull out the mote out of thy brother's eye." For if he who lays these things to thy charge, and glories in his own wisdom, has been separated from the company of the Gentiles, and possesses nothing [derived from] other people's goods, but is literally naked, and barefoot, and dwells homeless among the mountains, as any of those animals do which feed on grass, he will stand excused [in using such language], as being ignorant of the necessities of our mode of life. But if he do partake of what, in the opinion of men, is the property of others, and if [at the same time] he runs down their type, he proves himself most unjust, turning this kind of accusation against himself. For he will be found carrying about property not belonging to him, and coveting goods which are not his. And therefore has the Lord said: "Judge not, that ye be not judged: for with what judgment ye shall judge, ye shall be judged." [The meaning is] not certainly that we should not find fault with sinners, nor that we should consent to those who act wickedly; but that we should not pronounce an unfair judgment on the dispensations of God, inasmuch as He has Himself made provision that all things shall turn out for good, in a way consistent with justice. For, because He knew that we would make a good use of our substance which we should possess by receiving it from another, He says, "He that hath two coats, let him impart to him that hath none; and he that hath meat, let him do likewise."(2) And, "For I was an hungered, and ye gave Me meat; I was thirsty, and ye gave Me drink; I was naked and ye clothed Me." And, "When thou doest thine alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth." And we are proved to be righteous by whatsoever else we do well, redeeming, as it were, our property from strange hands. But thus do I say, "from strange hands," not as if the world were not God's possession, but that we have gifts of this sort, and receive them from others, in the same way as these men had them from the Egyptians who knew not God; and by means of these same do we erect in ourselves the tabernacle of God: for God dwells in those who act uprightly, as the Lord says: "Make to yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness, that they, when ye shall be put to flight,"(5) may receive you into eternal tabernacles." For whatsoever we acquired from unrighteousness when we were heathen, we are proved righteous, when we have become believers, by applying it to the Lord's advantage.
As a matter of course, therefore, these things were done beforehand in a type, and from them was the tabernacle of God constructed; those persons justly receiving them, as I have shown, while we were pointed out beforehand in them,--[we] who should afterwards serve God by the things of others. For the whole exodus of the people out of Egypt, which took place under divine guidance, was a type and image of the exodus of the Church which should take place from among the Gentiles; and for this cause He leads it out at last from this world into His own inheritance, which Moses the servant of God did not [bestow], but which Jesus the Son of God shall give for an inheritance. And if any one will devote a dose attention to those things which are stated by the prophets with regard to the [time of the] end, and those which John the disciple of the Lord saw in the Apocalypse, he will find that the nations [are to] receive the same plagues universally, as Egypt then did particularly
Read my the Real Messiah.
Buy it here
